No Good Deed Goes Unpunished
by NotARedhead
Summary: NOW COMPLETE. The further adventures of Tony and his friend Jess. Also involves Gibbs, Fornell, bank robbers, the FBI, and some wise words from Ducky. Standard disclaimer. All hail DPB.
1. Prologue

_Author's Note: This is the second story in what has become the "Tony & Jess" series. If you haven't read the first one (or don't remember it), there's enough basic information here to give you a general idea of who Jess is. However, if you want more background about her and her relationship to Tony, please see "From California to Peoria in Under Four Hours." And to those who read that story … this is the 'other story' alluded to in the Epilogue. Enjoy!_

**NO GOOD DEED GOES UNPUNISHED**

**PROLOGUE**

"This is another fine mess you've gotten yourself into, DiNozzo," Tony said to himself as he waited for the phone to ring again. It had been ringing at pretty much regular intervals – every fifteen minutes or so – since the standoff began. It was probably freaking out the other fifteen hostages, but it was okay with Tony, since it gave him some time to look around and map out what to do.

"Think it through," he said to himself. "Rule 20 – Think it through."

He'd managed to talk the gunmen into letting the pregnant bank teller leave. That was a good sign. The guys were willing to talk and they had some compassion. They'd sent out a note, so that meant they had demands, and they'd probably negotiate. Of course, they'd have to answer the phone to do that. No self-respecting hostage-taker was going to go on the strength of his note alone. Answering the phone was just part of the accepted protocol of modern hostage-taking. But the guys with the guns weren't answering. They weren't worried about it either. They were taking their time.

The phone rang again. Not just any phone either. It was Tony's phone. He could see it vibrating in the pile of phones that had been pushed against the wall. It occurred to Tony that he was really glad that his ring didn't have some weird soundbyte or videoclip on it. The last thing he needed was to hear the Red Hot Chili Peppers or Beyonce every fifteen minutes. He was especially glad that he'd removed the Disney tune that Abby had programmed as a joke one day when he was in a particularly surly mood. Hearing "I'm Just a Little Black Rain Cloud" every fifteen minutes would definitely hurt his 'tough guy' standing with the bad guys. He used to have the "Mission: Impossible" theme as his ring. That would have been kind of cool about now.

When the gunmen DID finally answer the phone, Tony knew the guy on the other end would be Fornell – the guys had specifically asked for FBI in the note. Tony chuckled. That would piss off Gibbs. And a pissed off Gibbs was a good thing, in this case.

The phone rang again.

Tony leaned his head back against the wall behind him and closed his eyes. How DID he get himself into these things?


	2. Chapter 1

**CHAPTER ONE**

_Three days earlier_

Tony knocked for the third time, something that was not particularly easy to do while trying to balance two bags of Thai food, a freezer bag with two pints of ice cream, and a six-pack of ready-made mojitos.

"Jess – come on!" he shouted. The dog next door started to bark.

He heard some fumbling behind the door, and then it popped open, a slightly disheveled woman standing behind it. She was in a pair of jeans, a t-shirt that was way too big (and, he suspected, his) and a pair of white crew socks. She looked like she'd been asleep, and he felt instantly contrite.

"I'm sorry, Tony," Jess began, as she took various packages from him. "I got home a little early and sat down to go through the mail. The next thing I know, I'm waking up and trying to figure out what's making that pounding noise." He looked at her with eyebrows raised and a grin, and she quickly ran her hands through her hair and over her face, to try and come off as a bit more alert and a little less dazed. He reached forward and ruffled his hand through her hair, effectively undoing any straightening she'd tried to do. She shook her head and turned to look at the packages on the counter.

"Thai food, strawberry ice cream, and mojitos. Oh, yeah," she said. "I'm going to be sick for a week." She shrugged, popped open a mojito, and drank about half of it down in one gulp.

"Whoa, there, Chiquita," Tony said, taking the bottle from her and putting it on the counter. He looked at her with a more critical eye. "You okay?"

"What?" she said, with a teasing tone, "You feel like playing Andy Garcia to my Meg Ryan?"

"No," Tony said, still surveying her face. "It's just that you normally go for the ice cream first."

"Sorry to break the mold," she said, sitting at the table and stretching. "It's been a long week."

"So you said earlier." Tony put the ice cream in the freezer and served some food onto two plates. He brought the plates to the table with the rest of her drink and one for himself. She reached out for the plate and the bottle.

"I'll be good," she said, as he slowly relinquished his hold on the bottle. She put the bottle on the table and started eating. "Thanks for this," she said between bites of pad thai. "I'd have gone to bed without eating anything otherwise."

Jess Kennedy had just started working in Strategic Operations for the Pentagon (D Ring), a job she'd gotten after Gibbs called in a couple of favors to get her an interview. Tony had known Jess since childhood, when they'd vowed to be best friends for the rest of their lives. Aside from a few bumpy years in college, they'd managed to keep that vow. After living all over the US – and a couple of places overseas – Jess had ended up in Barrow, Alaska working on a cooperative project with the NOAA. An old grudge held by a paroled convict brought her to DC and to Tony's doorstep, and that old grudge soon became a new case for NCIS. Once it was over, and the case was closed, it became Gibbs' personal mission to keep Jess in or near DC if at all possible. Even though Gibbs told himself that he'd done it simply because Tony seemed easier to handle when Jess was around, he also had to admit that for a woman who didn't have red hair, Jess Kennedy was someone he'd like to know better.

As they ate, Tony surveyed the townhouse, noticing opened and unopened boxes throughout the two rooms he could see. Furniture was placed, but bare – no pictures on the mantle, no books on the shelves, boxes of clothes and towels open in the hall. "I really like what you haven't done to the place," he said, with a raised eyebrow.

"Yeah, I know," Jess said, with a sigh. "I keep meaning to get it all unpacked and put away, but then the phone rings or the pager goes off or the Blackberry beeps, and before you know it, I'm working again. The phrase 'hit the ground running' is an understatement at the Pentagon." She looked up at Tony with an apologetic expression. "I know … I've still got stuff at your place too," she said. "I'm sorry."

He went to the counter to serve second helpings. "Why don't I come over this weekend – we can get you unpacked," he said, handing her another plate of food. "I'll bet I could even talk Gibbs into helping," he added, with an evil grin.

"Y'know," Jess said, with a tired smile, "I know you're doing that to push a button, but I'm way too tired to play 'Jessie's got a boyfriend' right now. If you and Gibbs want to come over and help me turn this from a storage unit into a workable living space, I'm all for it. I'll even cook." She looked at her bare-bones kitchen and then at the unopened boxes marked 'Kitchen' in big block letters. "Well," she amended, "at the very least, I'll place the pizza order."

Tony smiled, and they clinked bottles, both of them finishing their drinks. "It's a date," Tony said. "Or," he continued, impishly, "for two of you, it will be, anyway."

* * *

Friday afternoon, Tony reminded Gibbs (for the third time) about "Saturday at Jess' Place", and e-mailed him (for the fourth time) detailed directions to her townhouse. He'd asked McGee, Abby and Ziva if they were available to help as well, but it looked like it would be the moving team of DiNozzo & Gibbs the next day. McGee had family coming into town, Abby was with Habitat for Humanity, and Ziva was "busy."

"Busy, Ziva?" Tony asked, curiosity fairly seeping from his every pore. "Just … 'busy'?"

She ignored him.

"Does 'busy' have a name, or are you involved in some covert operation?" Tony circled her desk like a vulture.

"Oh for heaven's sake, Tony," Ziva said with an exasperated sigh. "If you must know, I have a date. I'm going on a picnic and to see an outdoor concert with one of the men I met at the American embassy when I was asking about my visa."

"A date with a diplomat," Tony said, trying to imagine what that would look like. "I'd almost cancel on Jess to be a fly on the wall there."

Ziva looked at him, ready for whatever he was going to dish out.

Tony seemed to be concentrating – trying to figure something out. "If you kill a diplomat, do you have immunity, or is that only if the diplomat kills you?"

Ziva opened her mouth to say something when Gibbs walked in.

"If you two don't get back to work," he said gruffly, "I'll kill you both, and it won't matter, now, will it?"

"No boss," Tony responded as he quickly sat and got back to work. "It won't."

* * *

Friday night found Tony at Jess' place, with the first load of stuff that they were transferring from his apartment to hers. When she first moved back from Alaska, Jess had spent three weeks living at Tony's until one of Abby's bowling buddies – who also happened to be a savvy DC real estate agent – helped her find a great two-bedroom townhouse on the outskirts of the city, with a quick and easy route to the Pentagon. Tony figured that they could get a head start on Friday night – then they could get up early on Saturday, finish by dinnertime, and everyone still had Sunday off. That was the plan.

By about 8 o'clock that evening, Tony's and Jess' cars had both been loaded and emptied, and the two were at Jess' place sorting through boxes and books and whatever else they'd managed to stuff into Tony's Mustang and Jess' Saturn. There wasn't much priority to what they were unpacking – a lot of the stuff at Tony's place had been "transition" stuff. The kind of things that you pack when you know you're staying somewhere for a while, but you don't want to get so comfortable that you forget you're really looking for a place of your own. It was mostly books and DVDs, clothes, important papers, extra towels, and the ugly stuffed cat that Tony had brought her in the hospital after the whole incident a few months earlier.

There was an open pizza box on the counter, a couple of open beers on the table, and a plastic container of olives and peppers providing some antipasti as they went through boxes and unpacked. A Sinatra CD was playing on the stereo, a compromise between the show tunes Jess wanted and the Dave Matthews CD Tony was pushing. Every once in a while, one of them would talk, but it was mostly Tony emptying boxes and stacking the contents wherever Jess told him to, and then Jess moving things into their actual homes. Occasionally, Tony would break into song, doing his best Sinatra imitation, and Jess would stop to watch. You wouldn't necessarily guess it to look at him, but Tony DiNozzo had some suave and debonair dance moves when he put his mind to it.

Finally, Tony had emptied the last box, flattened and stacked the boxes for the dumpster, and was just about to plop on the couch to watch Jess finish her part of the process. "The One That Got Away" was playing on the stereo.

"Tony?" Jess said, as she made note of the song, "what ever happened to … what was her name? … Monica? I meant to ask you earlier."

"Monica didn't work out," Tony said, with a straight face and no elaboration.

"Oh," Jess said, looking at him with a look of regret. "That's too bad. I liked Monica."

Tony barely held in a grin and regarded her with an expression of confused amusement. "No you didn't."

She looked at him with a kind of 'I told you so' expression. "No … I didn't," she said, as she went back to her unpacking. Tony laughed and went to toss the boxes in the dumpster.


	3. Chapter 2

**CHAPTER TWO**

Saturday dawned early. Jess was awake by 7 a.m. Tony called, saying that Gibbs was going to swing by his place first, where they'd load up the last of Jess' stuff and bring it over.

"Make coffee," Tony directed.

"Planning on it," Jess assured him.

By the time the guys arrived, there was a pot of coffee, a plate of bagels and cream cheese, and a pitcher of orange juice waiting for them. After a quick breakfast, Tony and Gibbs headed back outside to unload their cars while Jess made room for the incoming boxes and continued the unpacking from night before.

Gibbs had to leave at 11 o'clock to sign off on an evidence transfer, a favor he was doing for Abby so that she wouldn't have to leave her Habitat for Humanity site. Gibbs promised that he wouldn't be gone long and that he'd bring lunch back with him. Jess and Tony were happy for the break. They each grabbed a soda and headed for the deck.

"So …" Tony said. "Feeling more like home now?"

Jess nodded. "Yeah. I can't thank you guys enough. I have no idea when I'd have gotten to this if I had to do it on my own."

Tony smiled and pulled her into a one-arm hug. "I'm just glad to have you within easy driving distance for a change." It had been a long time since they'd lived near enough to see each other more often than once a year. "Have you got your bearings here yet?" he continued. "Know all the good stores? Restaurants? Strip clubs?" He raised his eyebrows suggestively.

"Yeah," Jess said with a laugh and a roll of the eyes. "Because, like you, strip clubs are a top priority for me when I'm scoping out real estate." She gave him a light punch in the side. "What I do need," she continued, "is a bank. Most of what I need to do I can do on-line or at the Pentagon, but I have some stuff that needs to go into a safe deposit box and I'd like that to be somewhere other than work."

Tony thought for a second. "My safe deposit box is in a bank about a block from the office," he said. "You can put your stuff there if you want. It'd save you the box rent and it would be easy for you to get to." She considered the offer. "Plus," he continued, tentatively, "if anything were ever to happen to me, then I'd know that …"

"Don't," Jess said, suddenly serious. They'd talked about this kind of thing before, and neither one of them really wanted to admit that they worked in risky and unpredictable professions. Tony's job was far more dangerous than Jess', but working at the Pentagon had its hazards too, especially since 9/11.

"I'm just saying…" Tony said, and then let his voice trail off. They looked at each other for a second, and Tony continued. "I'm just saying, that if you want to share the safe deposit box, there's plenty of room. Unless, of course, you're looking for a safe place for those weird Chinese dolls. Then, you're on your own."

Jess laughed, the tension of the earlier moment gone. "Thanks," she said. "I would love to put my few measly tokens and mementos into your safe deposit box. Just tell me where, and I'll get them there at some point."

"Give them to me at the end of the day, and I'll drop them in on Monday," Tony offered. "There's nothing there that you don't want me to see, right?" His eyebrows went up and he smiled suggestively. "No secret divorce settlements, envelopes of money, fake passports …?"

Jess shook her head at him with a chuckle. "You watch way too many movies." She reached over and gave him a quick hug. "Thanks," she said. "Remind me later."

"Will do," Tony replied, returning the hug. Then they stood against the railing, watching the traffic.

A minute later, Tony turned to her. "Hey Jess?" he said. "How'd you get that scar on your shoulder?" He reached over and pulled her t-shirt down over her shoulder and pointed to a triangle-shaped scar. "I saw it a while ago and I've been meaning to ask you."

"Sky diving," she said. His eyebrows went up. "Senior year. A bunch of us decided it would be a rush to jump out of a plane. I landed wrong. Broke my wrist, and rolled way off target into a sand pit. I think I hit the only rock in the area with my shoulder. Took off a hunk of skin."

He laughed.

"Have you ever?" she asked, cocking her head to the side. Tony looked confused.

"Skydived," Jess said. Then she frowned. "Skydove?" He laughed.

"Yeah," Tony replied, with an embarrassed grin. "It was part of a case. Gibbs and I went up, but I was the only one who jumped. Or, more accurately, fell out of the plane. I landed wrong too – didn't flex my knees enough. I sprained an ankle and was stiff and limping for a week."

"Then between the gash in my leg and this … I'm winning," Jess said with a smug smile. They had been playing "I have more scars than you do" since childhood.

"Oh, no," Tony said, reaching over to grab her. "I don't think so. I've been shot and beaten up and all sorts of things over the past year. You've been sitting in meeting rooms and behind control consoles. I am – and will always be – the Scar Master!"

He pulled her back into the house. They were jockeying for position as they moved into the living room. The two of them were rolling on the floor, wrestling and tickling each other when Gibbs walked in.

"I brought …," his voice started to fade out. "…lunch."

Tony and Jess stopped what they were doing and lay on the floor, breathing heavily and looking guiltily up at Gibbs.

Jess jumped up, lightly kicking Tony's leg as she walked over to Gibbs. She took the bag of sandwiches and kissed him on the cheek. "Thank you," she said sweetly. "Let me get you some fresh coffee."

Gibbs looked at Jess with a smile, then down at Tony. "Is he okay?" Gibbs asked, with just the merest touch of genuine concern.

"He's fine," she said, dismissing the question, taking Gibbs' arm and propelling him to the kitchen. "We were just discussing skydiving."

Tony grinned up at Gibbs.

"Of course you were," Gibbs said, shaking his head, with a slightly confused look on his face.

* * *

The rest of the afternoon passed quickly. Once they got into a rhythm, boxes were being emptied at a pretty good clip. They worked in relative silence, with only the music from the stereo playing in the background. It was an interesting conglomeration of music, actually. Each of them had chosen a CD from Jess' fairly eclectic collection, and then they'd set the CD changer on "random." Which meant that throughout the afternoon, they'd jump randomly from the Red Hot Chili Peppers (Tony) to the London cast album of "Oklahoma!" (Jess) to Chicago's Greatest Hits (Gibbs). Going from "Saturday in the Park" directly into "Californication" and then to "Surrey With the Fringe on Top" made for an interesting mix, but it kind of kept them on their toes.

By dinner time, almost everything was done except the clean-up. Jess ordered pizza, and the three sat on the floor of the living room, around the coffee table, as Tony told stories about adventures he and Jess had had as kids. Jess would frequently break in with "Um … that never happened …" with a side look to Gibbs, which of course made Tony 'embellish' his stories even more.

After dinner, Gibbs helped Tony put away the last of the kitchen stuff and then they spent an hour or so breaking down boxes and making dumpster runs. Then they each grabbed a beer and sat on the couch, looking around at the much more livable space they'd created out of the mountain of boxes that were there that morning. Jess was in the bedroom, putting away the last of the clothes and the shoes, something neither one of the guys were allowed to help with, much to their relief.

"So," Tony said, casually. "Where are you guys going for dinner tomorrow?"

"No idea," Gibbs said. He looked hopefully at Tony. "Any suggestions?"

Tony shrugged. "She likes barbecue and steaks just as much as fancier stuff … not a fan of Mediterranean food, in general." He thought for a moment. "And stay away from cauliflower and cilantro." Gibbs gave him a curious look. "Just trust me on this, Boss," Tony said.

"You two have a lot of history," said Gibbs, picking up a framed photo on the end table that showed a young Tony and Jess in home-made "Junior Spy" outfits.

"Yeah," Tony said with a genuine smile. "THAT shot," he continued, pointing his beer at the photo Gibbs was holding, "was taken the year I decided that being a secret agent would be cool." Gibbs laughed.

"Seriously," Tony said earnestly. "Did you ever see 'How I Spent My Summer Vacation'?"

"A movie, I take it?" Gibbs replied.

Tony nodded. "TV movie, starring Robert Wagner as this guy who collects information about all of these people at a summer resort. By the end of the movie, he's got files on all of them. Jess and I saw it on TV really late one night, and decided it would be fun to do the same thing. By the end of the summer, we had full dossiers on most of the people in the neighborhood. Names, addresses, work addresses, license plate numbers, photos … all sorts of stuff. We even had fingerprints."

"Fingerprints?" Gibbs said, with surprise.

"We'd sell lemonade on the corner and use glasses instead of paper cups. We'd offer free lemonade to anyone who we wanted to 'spy on' …"

Gibbs cut him off. "And then lift their prints after they gave the glass back." Tony nodded. "Very clever," Gibbs said with an appreciative nod. He'd just gotten more information about Tony's passion for investigation in that short conversation than he'd had since he hired him.

"It was a lot of fun," Tony said with a laugh, as Gibbs put the photo back on the table. "She probably still has the dossiers in a box somewhere. Who knows what she's got on me."

"Hi," Jess said, as she walked into the room. Both men jumped in surprise.

"Boy, for two Federal Agents, you guys are really easy to sneak up on," she teased.

Tony and Gibbs looked at each other, each one wondering how much she had heard of their conversation. Jess saw the look and smiled.

"Talking about me, were you?" she asked, playfully. They both looked up at her innocently. "Fine …" she said, staring down at Tony. "You know that I'm going to find out sooner or later." He looked guiltily at Gibbs.

"She will," Tony said, in a matter-of-fact tone.


	4. Chapter 3

**CHAPTER THREE**

Sunday night found Jess and Gibbs standing in front of a restaurant scoping out the menu. Neither one of them could come up with a "favorite place" they wanted to go, so it was decided that they'd meet early and wander around Georgetown, reading menus until they found a place they both liked.

They'd finally decided on Ristorante Piccolo, which promised "regional Italian cuisine at moderate prices." The place was warm and cozy and had three working fireplaces that added nicely to the ambiance. Gibbs and Jess ordered wine and dinner and made slightly uncomfortable small talk while they waited for food to arrive. Gibbs wasn't really a "small talk" kind of guy. Jess had been warned about this, but he was doing his best. There were a lot of long pauses as they each looked around the room, sipped their wine, looked at each other and smiled, and tried to think of things to talk about.

Jess had already told a couple of stories about her travels, hoping that one of the locations she'd mentioned would spark a similar story from Gibbs. But either Gibbs hadn't been anywhere – ever – or he didn't have any stories he cared to share. He seemed interested in her travels, and asked a lot of questions, but what she'd really been hoping for was to get a little more insight into this Leroy Jethro Gibbs guy.

Gibbs, for his part, felt badly that Jess ended up taking on the lion's share of the conversation. But his stories of traveling from base to base with Shannon and Kelly didn't seem to be nearly as interesting as her stories of street festivals in Berlin or camel rides in Australia. Besides, Gibbs wasn't a storyteller and Jess obviously was. So … he let her talk.

By the time the appetizers had come and gone, Jess felt as though she'd been giving a presentation for the Travel Channel. She felt like she was monopolizing the conversation. Every joke Tony had ever made about Jess being a 'motor mouth' or how she could talk a politician under the table came back to her, and it started to make her self-conscious. She smiled at Gibbs. "I'm sorry," she said, a bit sheepishly. "I get started telling stories sometimes, and it's hard to stop."

Gibbs smiled. Jess raised her eyebrows and looked at him quizzically. "Your turn?" she said, trying to lead him into conversation.

Gibbs chuckled and began to blush a bit. "I'm a little shy on topics, it seems …" he said.

"OK," Jess said, "I'll get you started." She thought for a second, and then smiled a slightly evil little smile. "What were you and Tony talking about yesterday when I came in the room?"

Gibbs smiled. "He was telling me about your 'junior spy' days and some movie about summer vacations."

"Oh my gosh," she said, with a smile. "'How I Spent My Summer Vacation' – I'd almost forgotten that. Yeah … that was a fun summer."

"You and Tony," Gibbs began, doing his best to push the conversation along. "You guys have a lot of history." She smiled and nodded. "Care to share any information?"

Jess looked at him and raised an eyebrow. "Please tell me that you're not this obvious when you're in interrogation."

He laughed. "Come on," Gibbs coaxed. "It doesn't have to be embarrassing or blackmailable. He spent all day yesterday telling stories about you. The only thing I know about him from that timeframe is that you guys were junior spies and that you have this weird scar competition." She laughed.

There was a pause. Gibbs was about to change tactics when Jess spoke.

"I don't know …" she began. "He's not that hard to understand. He's just … Tony." She smiled. "He likes playing basketball, but he doesn't like watching basketball. He likes his steaks rare, but his hamburgers well done. He can play concert-level piano but he can barely type. He's a great kisser…" she began, and then stopped suddenly and blushed.

"Finally," Gibbs said, a smirk on his face. "Something we have in common." He stared at her, and she returned his gaze and his smirk. They stayed locked in that stare as their dinners arrived. The waiter put down the plates silently and left.

Jess picked up her fork and smiled sweetly at Gibbs. "Yeah," she said, a playful glint in her eye. "I've seen you type."

Gibbs laughed out loud and picked up his fork. "THAT one, you're gonna pay for," he said, as he took his first bite of pasta.

"I certainly hope so," Jess responded under her breath, smiling to herself and thinking how much fun Tony would be having if he were monitoring their conversation. Then, she suddenly froze and surveyed every single item on the table. With Gibbs' confused expression following her movements, she picked up the small decorative cube that had held the list of specials, and dropped it in her water glass. You could never be too careful when it came to Tony.

* * *

The rest of the dinner went a bit better than the beginning. Once they started eating and drinking, the conversation flowed a little more smoothly. There were still chunks of silence, but it wasn't the kind of silence that you wallow in. After the dessert plates were gone and last of the coffee consumed, it was back to Jess' place for a nightcap. Gibbs wasn't entirely sure where the evening was supposed to go at this point. He was pretty rusty at the dating thing and wasn't sure what the modern protocols were. He decided to just "go with the flow," a phrase he didn't particularly like, but it seemed to fit the situation.

As Jess made coffee, Gibbs looked around the living room, searching for discussion topics. Jess appeared with coffee and liqueur and some kind of strange tea cookies that Gibbs had never seen before and they both settled on the couch. Gibbs' eyes fell upon the ugly stuffed cat Tony had brought her in the hospital a few months earlier.

"That's the cat that Tony bought you at the hospital, isn't it?" he asked, indicating the furry lump.

Jess laughed. "It is. It's ugly … I know."

"At the time," Gibbs remembered, "you said it looked just like 'Dino Kitty'." He smiled at her and asked, "What's that all about?"

Jess looked at Gibbs and blew out a breath. "OK," she said with a smile. "You wanted a DiNozzo story … here's a DiNozzo story." Gibbs folded his hands and put on his best 'attentive listener' face.

"I was, like, ten years old or something and it was just after Thanksgiving," Jess began. "Tony and I were window shopping in the big stores in Boston while his dad was having drinks at a fancy hotel bar."

She stood and walked to the mantle, taking the stuffed cat and bringing it back to the couch. "We saw this ugly stuffed cat in a toy store window, and I made some kind of comment like, 'No one will ever buy that cat – it's too ugly. Poor little kitty.' Tony laughed at me at the time, and kept kidding me about 'the poor little kitty'. I got mad at him and told him that everything deserved to be loved, even little ugly stuffed cats." She rolled her eyes. "It sounds really sappy now," she laughed. "But it was incredibly important to me at the time."

"I'm sure it was," Gibbs smiled, as he recalled his daughter Kelly and her attachment to various broken toys and stray animals.

"Tony's parents were the kind of parents who gave him very specific amounts of money and very specific instructions on how to spend it. Christmas presents for teachers, grandparents, important people, children of important people – those were all appropriate uses of his allowance. I, however, wasn't on Tony's parents' approved Christmas list – I was just the ever-present kid next door who got him hurt and taught him things they didn't think he needed to know."

Gibbs looked shocked. Jess laughed and continued. "Tony started shoveling sidewalks and delivering Christmas baskets, walking dogs, assembling toys – anything he could do to earn money. It was driving me nuts at the time, because he never had time to play. I couldn't understand why money was so important to him all of a sudden, and he wouldn't explain it to me." Jess started playing with the cat and tossing it in the air. "On Christmas morning, he knocked on my door and handed me this huge box, perfectly wrapped. The smile on his face as he handed it over was … I can't even describe it."

She looked at Gibbs. "You know his 'patented DiNozzo smile'?" she asked.

"Oh, yeah," Gibbs said, with a laugh and a nod.

"Well, this one was a hundred watts brighter." She smiled. "I opened the box, and inside was a ton of tissue paper and this one ugly stuffed cat. The card said, 'I'm a poor little kitty. Please love me'. Tony had earned enough money to buy it and then had talked his tutor into taking him back to Boston to pick it up. It was, I think, the very first thing he'd ever bought with money he earned himself. He was so proud of that."

"But … 'Dino Kitty'?" Gibbs asked.

"I used to call Tony Dino – short for 'DiNozzo', and don't you EVER tell him I told you that – and since it was a gift from him, I called it 'Dino Kitty'. He loved that."

"What happened to Dino Kitty number one?" Gibbs continued.

"I went through a purging phase in college, after Tony graduated and I was there on my own," Jess said with an apologetic look at the cat. "Got rid of a lot of stuff that now I wish I had kept. Dino Kitty was pretty much on his last legs by that time – he'd been re-sewn and re-stuffed so many times, I don't know that any part of him was actually original any more. So … it was out with the old." Jess smiled and hugged the cat.

"And now," Gibbs said, taking the cat from her and looking at it full in the face, "it's in with the new."

"And I thought I was sappy!" Jess said, with a burst of laughter. Gibbs grinned, unceremoniously hit her over the head with the stuffed cat, and pulled her into a kiss.


	5. Chapter 4

**CHAPTER FOUR**

Gibbs walked into the office the next morning with a slight smile on his face and a round of coffees for the house. He dropped one on each desk and sat down to work. Tony was the first one to follow him in. He saw the coffees, noticed Gibbs' relaxed demeanor, and reminded himself to call Jess later.

"'Mornin', Boss," Tony said. "Thanks for the coffee."

"Well," Gibbs said pleasantly, not really looking up from the screen, "it was on the way, and it was a nice morning."

Tony started mentally running a scenario. Jess lived pretty far outside the Beltway … he didn't remember seeing any Capital Coffee places near her apartment or on the ride between there and here, but then, he'd never really looked. Still … he was pretty observant and they had a distinctive logo. He pulled up a map of Jess' neighborhood and searched "Capital Coffee" – the closest one was eight miles out of the way. Then he pulled up Gibbs' place. One almost next door, but not another one between his place and work. If he'd stayed at Jess' place, he'd have had to leave before dawn to get home, change clothes and then stop by the coffee place. That would be early, even for Gibbs, and he'd miss breakfast with Jess, which he couldn't see Gibbs doing. Breakfast was one of Jess' best things. Of course … prepared Marine that he was, Gibbs would have had a change of clothes with him, but he would have never driven through rush hour traffic, eight miles out of the way, to bring coffee for the team unless …

Tony's thoughts were interrupted by a voice in front of him, much closer than he'd have expected. Gibbs was standing over Tony's desk. "If you want to know, DiNozzo, just ask," Gibbs said with a deadpan smile, as he watched Tony nearly jump out of his skin.

"Ask what, Boss?" Tony said, innocently, as he cleared his computer screen and went to e-mail. The first one on the incoming list was from Jess. Tony looked up into Gibbs' eyes and smiled the 'patented DiNozzo smile'. "I've got no questions."

Gibbs turned and sat down, smiling. Tony clicked on Jess' e-mail.

"We didn't," it read. "Get back to work." Tony laughed to himself, deleted the e-mail and looked across the room.

"Thanks again for the coffee, Boss," he said.

"My pleasure, Dino," Gibbs replied.

The next sound Gibbs heard was Tony's head hitting the desk, over and over and over again.

* * *

Ziva was the second one into the squad room that morning, followed by McGee. Both were surprised, but pleased, by their boss' offering of coffee. They looked at Tony for explanation; he just smiled and shrugged.

"Did anything come in yet this morning?" Ziva asked, hopefully. If there wasn't a case, it was going to be a day filled with paperwork. She hated filing.

"Not yet," Gibbs said. "But if you don't want to be at your desk, you can check with Abby to see if the ballistics results are in yet on that cold case." Ziva eagerly jumped at the chance to spend some time in the lab. Any time in the lab was time away from filing.

"I'm going to get the autopsy results from Ducky so that I can finish the Henderson file," McGee said, as he turned to leave.

"Mmm hmm," Gibbs responded, absently. McGee followed Ziva to the elevator.

"Uh … Boss," Tony began. "Not to leave you totally alone here, but I need to do a quick bank run – I promised Jess I'd drop some stuff for her in my …"

"Go ahead, DiNozzo," Gibbs cut him off. "Make it quick, and bring back some coffee."

"On it."

Gibbs didn't mind the solitude. He had some thinking to do anyway.

Tony sauntered across the street and up the block to the Virginia Savings and Loan branch that had recently been built in the office park near NCIS. He had transferred his safe deposit box here right after the bank had opened, since it was far more convenient than the next closest location and a lot easier to get to during the day. Plus, the teller who worked the safe deposit vault was cute, single, and totally had a crush on him.

* * *

The relative quiet of the squad room gave Gibbs some needed time to think about the prior evening. The kiss at Jess' apartment hadn't lead to anything; sure, they'd made out a little, but neither one of them was pressing for more. He'd pretty much finished his coffee and left – home early even by his standards.

He couldn't understand it. He liked Jess – she was funny and smart and didn't give an inch when she thought she was right. She had the look and the personality and the sensibilities that he usually went for in a woman (with the exception of the red hair), but there was something that didn't click. He wasn't sure what it was, but it left him with a dilemma. He was the man – he had to decide what the next step was. Gibbs chuckled to himself. Both Abby and Kate (and probably Ziva too, now that he thought about it) would roll their eyes at his antiquated dating methods. "It doesn't have to be you, you know," Abby would say. "This is the two thousands; you can wait for her to call you after a date." Kate would give him a lecture on a woman's role in society and how the woman had just as much right to make the first move as the man did; and Ziva would probably pick up the phone and call Jess herself, to find out if the relationship was going anywhere.

But that was the thing. It wasn't. At least, not in Gibbs' head. Jess, on the other hand, had been happy and animated all night. She'd enjoyed herself – he knew she had. But hell, she'd spent most of her life hanging out with Tony. He suspected that she could have fun anywhere and with anyone. She and DiNozzo were like two sides of the same person. They probably shared a brain. Maybe that was it. He couldn't click with Jess because dating Jess meant bringing Tony along for the ride too. And the last thing he needed was DiNozzo getting the inside scoop on his love life.

Gibbs sighed and looked at his watch. It had been almost an hour since Ziva, McGee and Tony had all headed out on their respective errands. They should have all been back by now. He tossed his coffee cup, stood and stretched. Then he headed to the lab to round up his wayward crew. They would be in the lab. It was always the first place any of them went when they wanted to hide.

Ziva, McGee and Abby were all enthralled by something on a computer when Gibbs walked in. No one even looked up when the airdoors swished.

"WHAT is that again?" Ziva said, squinting at the screen. McGee had the same look on his face. Abby was standing behind them. As she opened her mouth to speak, Gibbs cut her off.

"It's the reason two of my agents are about to get fired," he said gruffly.

McGee and Ziva both jumped and looked guiltily at Gibbs.

"Sorry, Gibbs," Abby said with a perky smile. "Totally my fault. I was doing a cross-section on these weird crystals that were scraped off the side of the brick wall outside the deli where that cold case murder took place, and when I put them up on the screen they looked **exactly** like this piece of artwork I saw in an on-line exhibit that was streaming live from this underground Chinese art gallery that McGee and I …"

"Abbs …" Gibbs warned. She stopped talking immediately. Gibbs turned to Ziva. "Ballistics?" Ziva scrambled to assemble the file. He looked at McGee. "Autopsy results?" McGee gathered them up off of Abby's desk. Ziva and McGee stood there with their hands full, looking like two college freshmen coming back from the first day of classes.

"Go," Gibbs said, his quiet tone not quite masking his annoyance.

Just then, the sound of the multiple sirens echoed off the streets and into the lab, making far more of an impact on the team than they would have had the team still been upstairs.

"Wow," Abby said. "Something's going down somewhere."

Gibbs' phone rang. "Fornell?" Gibbs said in surprise. There was a pause. "Yeah, Fornell, I hear the sirens. They're right outside the window. What did you do now?"

Gibbs listened for a minute more, as Abby, Ziva and McGee looked on with curious expressions. Then he snapped the phone closed.

"Three armed gunmen have taken over the Virginia Savings and Loan branch across the street," he said. "They're holding sixteen people hostage. They released one – a pregnant woman – and sent her out with a list of demands. Clipped to the list was DiNozzo's badge."

Gibbs turned and walked through the lab doors towards the elevator, with Ziva and McGee on his heels.


	6. Chapter 5

**CHAPTER FIVE **

The take-over had happened quickly. Tony was coming out of the safe deposit box vault, and had just begun chatting up the clerk, when the gunmen came in. He'd been instantly made as a cop, the badge on his belt clearly visible due to Tony's "comfortable laid-back flirting stance." He was going to need to work on that. The leader of the terrorist team had been pleased, and had announced to the others that they had a very valuable hostage. They'd taken Tony's badge and gun, keeping the gun and giving the badge to the pregnant teller to take out with her. Just so that the feds knew that the gunmen knew who they had inside the bank.

Tony had tried to talk the gunmen into trading his life for everyone else's, but that effort fell flat.

"You're valuable," the terrorist leader said. "But I won't know how valuable until I see how much your boss and his friends are willing to do to get you back in one piece. For all we know, they don't even like you." Then the leader looked at the safe deposit box clerk. "You might want to move, honey," he said. "If I take anyone out, I'm thinking the cop's first on the list. And with his inflated ego, he might just explode all over you."

The cute clerk looked at Tony with a mixture of regret, fear and distaste, and quickly moved to join the remaining hostages on the other side of the room.

Tony looked at the leader. "You don't have to be insulting," he said.

The leader laughed, and then he ordered Tony to collect any phones, pagers, Blackberrys, or other electronic devices that the rest of the group had. It was an impressive collection, really, and many of the items were not handed over easily. One woman literally burst into tears when Tony took her cellphone from her, and another nearly fought him over her iPod. One bank executive flat-out refused to hand over his Blackberry.

"My entire life is on this thing!" the executive said, angrily. "I'm not giving it up."

Tony looked at the man incredulously. One of the three armed men started towards him, but the leader of the group held him back. He wanted to see what Tony would do.

Tony cocked his head to the side, regarding the small handheld. "Is that the new 8705g?" he asked. "I thought those were only available in England."

The banker shook his head. "Nope," he said smugly. "They came out in the States three days ago." He held it out to show Tony while also keeping a tight grip on it.

Tony raised his eyebrows and whistled in appreciation. "Expensive?" he said with a slight grin.

"A little pricey," the banker admitted, with a slight smile of his own. "But worth it."

"Cool," Tony said. His light demeanor didn't change as he collected the rest of the electronics and turned back to the hostage-takers.

"Got them all but that guy's," Tony said to the leader as he indicated the banker, still standing by the desk, holding his Blackberry. "But it's a very cool piece. Definitely worth dying for." He glanced over his shoulder at the banker, who paled considerably.

The leader of the group smiled a half-smile and pointed to the corner. "Put them over there," he said to Tony. And then the leader walked towards the banker, who was still clutching his hand-held computer. "Last chance," he said, quietly.

There was a beat of silence. Then, "Hey!" the banker called, trying to get Tony's attention. "You!" he said. "You – cop!"

Tony turned. The banker tossed the Blackberry to Tony, who caught it easily and put it with the others.

"Good choice," the leader said calmly. "Very good choice." The banker sheepishly sat down.

"Put yours on top," the leader instructed as Tony piled all the phones near a potted plant. "I'm thinking that you're going to be pretty popular with your FBI pals in a little while."

Tony sighed. He hated hostage negotiation. He'd done it a few times in Baltimore, and he was pretty good at it. But he really didn't like it. It was high-stress and unpredictable and it really depended on who was on the other end of the phone. This time, it would be Fornell on the phone with Gibbs and the rest of the team standing close enough to hear. And as soon as the bank robbery hit the news – which it probably already had, judging from the crowd gathering outside – there would be press and police and other agencies and protesters and … shit. And Jess. Tony blew out a breath and looked to the ceiling. She was probably already on her way. If it was Jess hostage inside a bank somewhere, Tony would do everything he could to get there. So, yeah … Jess would be there too. Tony suddenly found himself glad that Gibbs seemed to have enjoyed his date last night. Because if he hadn't, Jess showing up would not be something his boss would easily tolerate.

* * *

Back in the squad room, Gibbs and his team were frustrated. The note from the hostage-takers had specifically requested FBI, and Fornell had been just a little too happy to be on the receiving end of the situation.

"There are three men with guns holding innocent people hostage, Fornell," Gibbs had said. "You don't have to be so happy about it."

"Oh come on, Jethro," Fornell had replied with a small smile. "If you were running a hostage op from the front of the FBI Building, you'd be puffing out your chest like a peacock."

"Just don't hit anything you shouldn't be hitting when you piss on your territory," Gibbs had said, with a surly expression. And then he had gone back upstairs to try and figure out how to keep the FBI from getting DiNozzo killed.

The elevator dinged, and Gibbs looked up in time to see Jess walk out of the car and into the bullpen. He closed his eyes for a moment and sighed. While he'd expected her to materialize once she'd heard that Tony was a hostage, he just didn't have time for this.

"You've obviously seen the news," he said, in a voice that sounded far less annoyed than he felt.

"Yeah," she said, cautiously. She wasn't sure she'd be welcomed.

"You'll be in the way here," Ziva said, bluntly confirming Jess' fears. "We don't have the personnel to help Tony and keep an eye on you too."

"Ziva," Gibbs said, hoping to nip this conversation in the bud quickly.

Jess turned a steely look on Ziva. "I'm an expert in strategic operations, Ziva," she said quietly. "I can help you." Ziva's eyes narrowed.

Jess' tone carried a little bit of desperation. She wanted to stay. She _needed_ to stay. Gibbs had to see that. Jess turned to face Gibbs. "No one needs to 'keep and eye' on me," she said, pleading her case. "But I can't just sit in my office, watch the news and do nothing …"

There was no response.

"Look," Jess said, ready to turn and head back outside. "I can work with you here, or I can go downstairs and offer my services to the FBI. But I'm not leaving."

"I can have her in cuffs in 15 seconds," Ziva said to Gibbs, her eyes not leaving Jess.

"Ladies," Gibbs said, tersely. "Can we save this for later? After Tony and the _other hostages_ have been released?" He stressed the words 'other hostages', reminding them that Tony was, really, the least of their problems. Tony knew how to handle himself in situations like this. The other fifteen people didn't.

There was a beat of silence as Jess and Ziva called an unspoken truce. They turned to look at Gibbs. McGee let out the breath he'd been holding.

"McGee," Gibbs began, "get me the blueprints for the Virginia Savings & Loan. I want to know every single way in and out of that building."

"You got it, Boss." McGee instantly went to work.

"Ziva," Gibbs continued, "coordinate with the FBI and keep us in the loop. I want to know what's going on without them necessarily knowing that we know what's going on."

"On it." Ziva said.

"And Jess," Gibbs said, with a look and a tone of voice that made it clear she was there at his discretion, "as long as you're going to be here, take Tony's desk. I want you to find similar take-over scenarios on the east coast over the past few years, and then expand to cover the rest of the country. I know the FBI is looking for them, but another set of brains won't hurt."

"Thank you," Jess said, quietly and sincerely. Gibbs' body language softened a bit. He gave her a small reassuring smile.

Jess sat at Tony's desk and glanced at the photo of her and Tony that he kept in a small frame near his phone. Then she logged in and got to work.

"I'm going back downstairs to see what's going on," Gibbs said, as he took his coffee and headed to the elevator. He stopped and looked at Ziva and Jess. Then he looked at McGee. "You're in charge," he said to the younger agent. McGee looked up in surprise. "Keep them from killing each other, will you?" Then Gibbs got in the elevator.

The elevator doors closed, and both women looked at McGee, who suddenly felt very small and very much alone sitting behind his desk. "Let's … um … let's get to work and get Tony out of there," he said, in a more commanding voice than he'd expected to come out of his mouth.

Jess and Ziva looked at him, then at each other, and then all three of them turned to their tasks.


	7. Chapter 6

**CHAPTER SIX**

It had been two hours since Tony walked into the bank. He'd been standing against the counter the entire time, watching the three gunmen. They were an odd trio. The leader was named Cal, and the youngest of the three was Tyler. Whether that was his first or last name, Tony couldn't tell, but the kid was nervous. Not "I don't want to be here" nervous or "We shouldn't be doing this" nervous. It was more like "I hope I don't mess up and make Cal look bad" nervous. They were brothers, maybe.

The third one – the one with the temper – was named Mick. Cal had already yelled at him three times for what football referees would call 'unnecessary roughness'. Cal had berated him for shoving hostages, breaking a glass table, and screaming so violently at an older woman to sit that she nearly had a heart attack. Mick was the one who was pumped and pissed and ready to snap. Tony had seen cops like that, and he didn't envy anyone who had to try to keep a guy like that in line.

Cal, so far, had seemed pretty level-headed and accommodating. He was patient. He didn't care that Tony's cellphone kept ringing – he didn't seem to be in any particular hurry to start negotiating or demanding action. He seemed to know exactly what he was doing, which made him dangerous in a different way than Mick was dangerous. Cal had come here for a reason and wasn't leaving until he'd taken care of everything on his agenda. Unfortunately Tony didn't know what that agenda was.

Cal saw Tony intently watching the three men, and he walked over to the agent to have a little chat. It occurred to both Cal and Tony that under different circumstances the men could probably have been friends. They both had the same intensity about their jobs, but they also laced that intensity with a sense of humor and an overall calm demeanor. Neither one wanted anyone to get hurt here, but both of them wanted the outcome to go their way. 'He'd be an interesting chess partner', Cal thought as he approached Tony at the counter.

"You're awfully quiet," Cal said with a half-grin, gun hanging lazily at his side.

"You're not exactly a Chatty Cathy yourself," Tony replied.

Cal cocked his head to the side to acknowledge the comment. "Quiet Feds worry me."

"As do quiet bank robbers," Tony said.

The two men looked at each other, playing a mental game of 'chicken' to see who's curiosity would break first. If this were an interrogation scenario, Tony would have stared Cal down easily, but right now it was Cal with the gun and Tony without, and frankly, Tony was getting a little tired of this quiet little standoff. He was all for non-violence, but if you're going to hold a bunch of people hostage, at least follow the rules.

"So …" Tony said, in a conversational tone that nearly threw Cal off with its casualness. "What's the deal? Please tell me we're not all here just because you wanted to fulfill some cops and robbers fantasy from childhood."

Cal's face grew more serious; his grip on his gun tightened. Tony slightly cleared his throat, realizing that he may have just wandered into quicksand.

"This is not a game," Cal said. "It doesn't have to be violent, and it doesn't have to be unpleasant. But it is not a game."

Tony put his hands up in a calming gesture. "OK … Sorry," he said. "Just a little skittish here. I revert to humor in tense situations." Cal softened slightly. "So," Tony continued carefully. "Why the standoff? Why …" he gestured to the group of hostages, the bank, the other men, "… this?"

"Attention," said Cal simply. "We needed the attention."

Tony's eyebrows went up as he gave Cal a questioning look.

"People pay attention when you rob a bank, close a business, take hostages, and have guns." Cal looked around the room. "People who wouldn't listen to us before will listen to us now."

Tony smiled. "I should have thought of that when I was nine," he said. "Would have been way more fun than holding my breath."

Tony's phone rang again. He could see it in the pile of phones that had been kicked into the corner. He had to get these guys talking.

"Look," Tony said. "That's going to be the FBI … again … trying to set up communications. Let me answer it and let's get this ball rolling."

Mick walked over to the conversation, angry that the two men seemed to have established a rapport.

"What's the rush, pretty boy?" he said with a little more bite to his voice than was probably necessary.

Tony smiled and shrugged. "I have a date tonight."

Mick pulled back as if to hit Tony, but Cal stopped him, considering Tony's request. He looked at his watch. "OK … Answer your phone," Cal said calmly. Cal motioned to Tyler, who hovered close by. Tony walked to the corner, picked up his phone and flipped it open.

"DiNozzo."

"It's about time you answered, DiNozzo," Fornell said. "I've been calling for over an hour."

"Sorry, Fornell," Tony returned with an edge to his voice. "But we're busy in here. A lot going on. Charades, shadow puppets, baby pictures. Right now, Mick is teaching us all the tango." Cal bit back a laugh. Fornell, who wasn't as used to Tony's personality as was Gibbs, was momentarily taken aback by the humor.

"Fornell," Tony said, in a slightly irritated tone. "You there?"

"I'm here," Fornell replied, recovering quickly. "We've gotten the note. What doesn't it say?"

Tony turned to Cal. "The FBI is asking for subtext. What didn't make it into the note?"

Cal considered the question. "What you see is what you get," he said, simply. "Money, safety, air time – that's pretty much it." Tony turned back to his phone. "Oh …" Cal said, interrupting Tony's response. "One more thing. We're not releasing anyone else as a 'good faith' gesture, none of us have mothers or wives you can bring to talk us into surrender, and we will not hesitate to harm the people in this building if it comes to that. We don't want to, but we will if we have to." He leveled a steely look at Tony, whose face mirrored the other man's intensity.

Tony relayed the information to Fornell, then snapped his phone shut. He really didn't like hanging up on the FBI this early in the game, but Cal had to see that Tony would relay information without trying to sneak in a clue or a plan. That would come later.

Gibbs walked out of the NCIS building and up the street a few more feet to the FBI van that was acting as the command post for Fornell and his team.

"What do we know?" Gibbs asked, as Fornell hung up the phone.

Fornell considered not telling Gibbs anything – this was, after all, an FBI op and those NCIS guys had a tendency to get in the way. But he quickly abandoned that tactic. It was Jethro's man who was in there, after all, and if the situation was reversed, he'd want Jethro to level with him. Fornell looked at Gibbs, accepting the cup of coffee Gibbs had brought him.

"From the bank teller, we know that there are three men, all heavily armed. One is particularly jumpy." Fornell took a sip of the coffee. "From the note, we know that they want safe passage, $1.2 million dollars – unmarked and untraceable, and a live press conference in prime time tonight." Gibbs checked his watch; they had about seven hours. "From the phone call I just finished, we know that they're serious and dangerous." Gibbs frowned a bit. "And from DiNotzo," Fornell continued, "we know that one of the guys is named Mick and that they all apparently share your agent's off-kilter sense of humor."

"How do you know that?" Gibbs asked.

"Because no one has shot him yet."

Gibbs rolled his eyes. "What did you get off the note?"

"Don't ask me," Fornell said, with an annoyed smirk. "Your forensic tech has had it for over an hour. I keep sending guys down there to check, but we haven't heard anything back." Gibbs turned and headed for the lab.

* * *

"Meet Calvin Davidson, Tyler Davidson, and Michael O'Hara," Abby said, pointing to the screen as Gibbs walked into the lab. "I was just about to send this upstairs."

"How do we know these are our guys?" Gibbs asked.

"Tyler Davidson's prints were on the note, there was a partial of O'Hara's on Tony's badge."

"And the other Davidson?"

Abby smiled proudly. "Oh …," she said. "THAT one, I got off the teller."

Gibbs looked at her suspiciously.

"Apparently Calvin Davidson is quite the gentleman," Abby said with a pronounced 'high society' accent. Gibbs waved his hand in a 'get on with it' motion. "She said that she'd asked for her purse when he sent her out with the note and Tony's badge. When Davidson handed it to her, he left a big ol' thumbprint right there on the leather." Abby looked very pleased with herself.

"And why doesn't the FBI have this information, Abbs?" Gibbs said, with just enough bite to get her attention.

"I just got the final match," Abby said, disappointed that he wasn't more impressed. "I was about to take it upstairs but you got here first."

Gibbs took the file out of her hands and headed out the door and back up to street level.

"That's good work, Abbs," Abby said to herself in a Gibbs-like voice. "Why thank you, Gibbs," Abby said, answering herself and turning back to her computer.


	8. Chapter 7

**CHAPTER SEVEN**

It had now been four hours since the stand-off started. Outside the bank it was "hurry up and wait" while the FBI made a show of negotiating for the money and the media coverage. They had to wait long enough for it to look realistic, but not so long that it looked suspicious. Two SWAT vans that had been reworked to look like news broadcast trucks had been pulled into position near the bank. The vans held just enough equipment and quickly-applied news decals to look convincing from the hostage-taker's point of view, but inside they held enough tactical equipment and personnel to mount a full assault of the bank if that became necessary.

Inside the bank the hostages were settling into their situation, most of them realizing that they were in no imminent danger as long as they stayed quiet and didn't try any quick moves. One of the group had illustrated this to them when he decided to take control of the situation.

"I'm not entirely sure I'd do that," Tony said, as the man – later identified as a commodities trader named Eric – made his way over to Cal.

"Yeah, Fed?" Eric responded, in a condescending 'I'm so much more important than you, I shouldn't even be speaking to you' tone of voice. "Well, I have things I need to get done today, and I'm not spending another hour in this bank while you make friends."

"I'm just sayin'," Tony began casually, as Eric walked straight to Cal, with purpose and anger.

Eric had gotten within a few steps of Cal when Mick came up behind the investment banker, grabbed his arm, wrenched it behind him, and cleanly broke it, with a sickening 'snap'. Eric screamed, then swore, then crumpled to the ground.

"Damn it, Mick!" Cal said, shoving the other man out of the way. Mick smiled and chuckled at the banker writhing on the floor.

Tony kept calm and sighed as he looked at the banker. He could tell the man was in pain, but it certainly wasn't life-threatening. "I told you," he said, matter-of-factly. Then, he turned to the rest of the group. "Anyone here a doctor? Nurse? Eagle scout with a first aid badge?"

A young Asian man sitting quietly in the back tentatively raised his hand. "I'm a student in applied nursing at George Washington."

"Come on down, then," Tony said, with game-show-host aplomb. Then he quickly held up his hand in a 'stop' motion and turned to look at Cal. "Sorry, man," Tony said to the gunmen's leader. "Not my place. Is it okay? To help him, I mean?" Tony gestured to Eric, still in obvious pain on the floor.

Cal smiled and thought, 'yup, a great chess partner'. But he nodded and allowed the assistance.

"Thanks," Tony said, with slightly exaggerated gratitude. He motioned to the Asian man, who cautiously came over. "I'm Tony."

"I'm Haruki," the Asian man said. "My friends call me Harry."

"OK, Harry," Tony said with a smile. "You know how to set an arm?"

Harry nodded. The next hour or so was focused on the efforts of Tony and Harry to treat Eric as best they could. They used a splint set that they found in a first aid kit in the bank's break room. The break room was located off a long hallway that led to a back exit. 'Probably where the smokers sneak out for breaks', Tony thought. Tyler had accompanied them to the break room and was intently watching Harry, to make certain the ONLY thing he took was the First Aid kit. Tony, meanwhile, was scanning every inch of the hallway, looking for an escape route or an entry location. Just as Harry located the kit, Tony noticed a very slight sliver of light coming in through the exit door. It looked to be propped open, just barely – probably by a pebble or stick or something else that someone had tracked in. Tony smiled to himself. He had a way for the FBI to get into the bank. He just had to figure out a way to tell Fornell.

"What are you smiling at?" Tyler asked, not sure if he should be worried or not.

"Just glad we found a First Aid kit," Tony said, smoothly covering his discovery and focusing Tyler's attention back towards the bank. "I really didn't want to start breaking furniture and ripping up peoples' shirts to create a splint."

Tyler looked at him a bit cautiously and then glanced around the hallway. Seeing nothing out of the ordinary, he gently pushed Harry and Tony towards the door that led out of the hallway and back to the main bank lobby, clicking the lock on the hallway door as they joined the rest of the group.

The break of the arm had been clean – Tony complimented Mick on that – and the splint was easily applied. One of the older women in the group offered her scarf as a sling, and Tony had to bite back a laugh as he helped Eric, outfitted with his awkward splint and a brand new bright pink paisley sling, over to one of the couches. A few Tylenols and a mumbled apology later, Eric was off in a corner, nursing his arm and planning a lawsuit against his karate instructor for not better preparing him for such a situation.

Harry had cleaned up the area, stowed the first aid kit under one of the lobby coffee tables, "just in case," and went back to his studying. He wondered if he'd get extra credit for this.

Tony moved back to his original position near the counter, his phone, and the bad guys.

"Anyone else want to play hero?" Mick said, with a menacing glare at the hostages. They all looked at him silently, some shaking their heads, others meeting his eyes and then quickly dropping their gazes to their laps. Mick was satisfied.

Tyler walked over and looked at Tony. "You didn't try to bring in paramedics or have him sent out for treatment," he said, suddenly. Everyone was a bit startled. Tyler had barely spoken since the takeover had begun.

"Who, me?" Tony said, looking around. He was also surprised at Tyler's newly-found conversational skills.

Tyler repeated his statement, this time in the form of a question. "Why didn't you try to bring in paramedics or have him sent outside?"

Tony shrugged. "Cal said there wouldn't be any more 'good faith' gestures. It would've been a waste of time. And the injury wasn't that serious. I'm not falling on a sword for a broken arm."

Tyler looked at Tony intently for a moment, and then moved back to his place near the hostages. Tony looked at Cal, who chuckled lightly and let his gun drop back down to his side.

* * *

Outside the bank and inside NCIS headquarters, things were moving along at a fairly steady clip. Ziva had been stationed in an office near the entrance to the building, sharing the command center with four of Fornell's men. She'd used what Tony called her 'super ninja powers' to eavesdrop on pretty much every aspect of the FBI's plan. Gibbs almost had more information than Fornell did.

McGee had pulled every piece of information he could find about the Virginia Savings & Loan branch – building permits, licenses, contractor info, blueprints, conceptuals vs. 'as-built' diagrams; he even had a list of the people who had been on hand at the groundbreaking and dedication. Once he passed that all on to Gibbs, McGee had been sent downstairs to update Abby and to gather as much information on the gunmen as they could find. They were running them through every database they had access to. And a few that McGee got them into anyway.

Jess had passed along the 'similar MO' intel to the FBI's research guy, who was grateful for the help. She'd been able to dig deeper and higher, due to some back-door clearances she'd managed to hang onto after her stint at NORAD. It was through her intel that they determined that this was the work of "Peace Before Profit", the same group that had threatened the IMF / World Bank meetings in Washington DC earlier in the year. The men holding Tony and the other hostages were small-time members of the group who were running a rogue operation to gain some publicity and stature within the larger _Paix Avant Bénéfice_ organization, based in Montreal.

Gibbs sat at his desk, looking through the files they had on the organization, trying to see something that the FBI had missed.

"It's not Tony's fault, you know," Jess said quietly, from her place at Tony's desk. Gibbs had almost forgotten she was there.

"What?" Gibbs replied, looking up from his computer.

"That he's in there." She continued, running her hands through her hair and stretching. "I was supposed to hit the bank sometime this week, to drop some papers in the safe deposit box. He went in this morning so that I wouldn't have to." She didn't sound as though she was blaming herself; she was just stating a fact.

"It's not your fault either, Jess," Gibbs reassured her anyway.

"Yeah," she said, with a half-smile. "I know." She gave him an earnest look. "I just didn't want you to think he'd been stupid or reckless and gotten himself into …" her voice faded out.

"Tony's not stupid, Jess," Gibbs said, as he walked over to the desk and looked her in the eye. "Frustrating? Yes. Annoying as hell sometimes? Uh huh." Jess smiled and chuckled. "But he's a great agent, Jess. He knows what he's doing. If I didn't believe that, I'd have pushed Fornell to send in a team or pull in another negotiator. But Tony's good on his own; he's at his best on his own. He's been in this situation before. He'll get everyone out alive."

"Can I tell him that you said he was a great agent?" she said, with a small smile.

"I'll tell him myself, when this is done, OK?" Gibbs responded, returning to his desk.

"I'm holding you to that, Jethro," Jess said, as she turned back to the computer.


	9. Chapter 8

**CHAPTER EIGHT**

It was hour ten. Tony had walked into the bank at 8:52 a.m. and it was now nearly 7 p.m. They had an hour until prime-time began.

The FBI had been stalling since just after one, when Tony had talked Cal into getting food and water for the hostages. A case of bottled water had been delivered, along with two dozen box lunches that had been prepared by the Red Cross. The group ate in silence, and then Cal allowed everyone to go to the bathroom, in pairs and accompanied by Tyler. Tony had made his bathroom trip with the bank exec who hadn't wanted to give up his Blackberry. The guy looked jumpy – as jumpy as Mick, but in a different way.

"You doing okay?" Tony asked him. Tony made a point to talk loudly enough so that Tyler heard him. He didn't want anyone to think that he was trying to hatch a plan or make trouble.

The guy looked like he was going to hyperventilate. "No," he said in a breathy voice. "Not really. I have this … condition. Anxiety."

'Oh great', Tony thought.

The man continued. "I have medication for it. In my desk. I need to get it. Can you help me?" He spoke in short sentences, with a kind of staccato delivery. He was definitely close to losing it.

Tony looked at Tyler. "Can we go to his desk and get this guy his meds?"

Tyler stood silently, with a 'deer in the headlights' look on his face.

"Hello?" Tony said to Tyler. Tyler did not respond. 'Geez', Tony thought. 'This kid is just as scared as the banker'.

"What's the problem?" Cal said, taking a step or two in their direction.

Tony pointed to the banker. "This guy needs to take his medication. Bottle's in his desk. Can he get it?"

Cal sent Mick over to cover the hostages, just in case this was a trick. Then Cal accompanied the banker to his desk to get the pills and sent him back to the bathroom area, where the water fountains were.

"Thank you," Tony said, as Cal settled himself back at the front of the bank. Cal nodded.

As the banker bent over to get a drink of water, Tony 'accidentally' hit the back of the guy's knee, causing the man's leg to buckle. As the banker fell to the floor, Tyler instinctively reached to help him, which took everyone's focus off Tony long enough for him to unlock the lock on the door that led to the exit hall. He still wasn't sure when he'd be able to use the discovered entry / exit route, but he wanted to be ready.

By three o'clock, the group was back in their holding area on the west side of the lobby, some of them dozing, two guys playing some geographical trivia game they found in a magazine, and a group of three women trading scrapbook ideas in the corner. Harry was studying; Eric was regaling the cute safe deposit box clerk with his harrowing ordeal. She was looking up at him in awe, as if he'd just pulled them all out of the bowels of the _Poseidon_. Tony sighed. He'd have no chance with her now.

Tony had to admit that as far as take-overs went, this one didn't really have the intensity of others he'd been in. Over the past several hours, he had learned the best place in Annapolis to buy scrapbooking supplies, that 'Gibbs' was the name of a town in Missouri, and that the Red Cross made killer oatmeal chocolate chip cookies. Not exactly normal intel for a hostage situation. He was still getting tired of it all, though. The waiting and watching and not knowing what was going on outside was making him edgy. It was getting harder and harder for him to keep up the 'calm and cool' façade.

By about 4 p.m., Tony had been on the phone seven or eight times with Fornell, but the FBI was still no closer to setting up the news conference, no escape vehicles had been delivered, and there was no indication that money was being arranged. Tony knew that this was a typical tactic – draw it out, especially if there doesn't appear to be any danger. But man, he hated this part. The whole 'hurry up and wait' thing. Tony thought about asking Cal why they took over the bank so early in the day if what they were wanting was a prime-time press conference, since it would have seemed more logical to wait until, say, mid-afternoon, but he decided he shouldn't push his luck.

It was about 5 p.m. when Cal started to get a little testy. He'd been calm and controlled through the entire day, but as prime-time approached, he got more and more anxious. He finally pulled the bank manager off the couch in the Loan Department waiting area and had him empty all of the teller drawers into one large banker's box. Any loose cash in the front of the bank was added, although he never asked for people's individual purses and wallets. Tony was a little bit impressed by that, and had called Cal 'Robin Hood' at one point. Cal hadn't minded, and it had drawn a smile out of Tyler.

Two of the tellers spent the next 20 minutes counting, stacking and banding the cash, which totaled just under $100,000. Tony relayed this information to Fornell, who promised to have the remainder of the money within the next two hours.

Just before seven o'clock, Cal told Tony to call Fornell again. He was clearly irritated.

"This has all been fun," Cal said in a terse voice, "but your guys aren't keeping up their side of the bargain."

"They're not my guys," Tony snapped. He was tired of the FBI stalling too.

"Whatever," Cal bit back at him. "Call him and tell him. We have been more than patient. If they need bodies to start paying attention, I can give them bodies."

Tony and Cal stared at each other for a few seconds as Mick circled them, ready to pounce. Tyler shifted back and forth on the balls of his feet, trying to use up excess energy. He was nervous and getting antsy. The hostages had stopped what they were doing and were intently watching the unfolding drama. Tony flipped open his phone and made the call.

"Look Tobias," Tony said, stressing Fornell's first name to make sure he listened. "These guys want the rest of their money, their way out, and that press conference. You've had more than enough time to set it up, and yet we see no signs of that. I've got three guns to my head – literally. I'm not having fun here. I need an assurance that this is going to happen, or they're going to start tossing bodies out the door."

"Stupid feebs," Mick yelled in the background. "Can't do anything right!" He aimed his gun at the group of hostages now huddled near the loan department. They flinched almost as one. One of the women gasped audibly. Cal's aim moved quickly and purposely to put his gun barrel directly into Mick's face. "What the …?" Mick said in surprise.

"Back off, Mick," Cal said. His voice was as cold and hard as Gibbs' could be, and Tony had to be just a little bit impressed. "This isn't going to make the FBI work any faster." Mick put his weapon down and stepped back. Cal refocused a steady and steely gaze on Tony.

"You understand where we are here, Tobias?" Tony said into the phone. Fornell had heard the whole exchange.

"I understand," Fornell replied. "Anything else?"

"Yeah," Tony said, his voice strangely light. "Tell my girlfriend to go let my dog out." Cal looked at Tony suspiciously. Then Tony snapped the phone shut. "I have a dog," he said to Cal with a shrug. "It's been over ten hours since I've been home. When this is over, I'd like to not walk into an apartment filled with dog crap."

Cal put his gun barrel down and laughed, the tension in the room temporarily broken. "Can't argue with that," he said.

Fornell closed his phone and told the two agents with him that they needed to start setting up for the mock press conference.

"Make it loud and obvious and be sure the guys in the bank know what you're doing," he told them.

They nodded and headed for the news vans. Fornell walked over to where Gibbs was standing.

"Jethro," Fornell began, "is there some reason why DiNozzo would tell me to have his girlfriend let his dog out? Does he even have a dog? For that matter, does he even have a girlfriend?"

Gibbs looked at the other agent for a minute as he tried to figure out what Tony was trying to tell them. Then he turned to where the rest of the team and Jess were standing. He motioned to Jess, who came quickly over to them. "Ask her," he said to Fornell.

Fornell looked at Gibbs, then at Jess. "DiNozzo wants to know if you can go let his dog out."

Jess' face slowly grew into a smile.

"Care to translate, Miss Kennedy?" Gibbs asked.

Jess explained. "Tony and I used to have all sorts of code words and phrases to help us get our stories straight if we were talking to our parents or to sneak each other into or out of places. We must have had dozens."

"And what does it mean to let the dog out?" Fornell asked.

Jess grinned. "It means, 'I'll leave the back door open'."

"McGee!" Gibbs yelled. "I need those bank plans!"


	10. Chapter 9

**CHAPTER NINE **

It took Gibbs, Fornell, McGee and Jess just over a half-hour to put together a tactical plan to rush the bank. And once everyone else had been briefed, the dénouement came fairly quickly.

Gibbs sent Ziva and McGee to check out the back of the bank to locate the "back door" that Tony had left open. There were four doors in the back of the building, but it only took a quick look to see the hallway door that was just slightly ajar. It was probably clearer from the outside than the inside, particularly with the early evening shadows being cast by the security lights.

Once they'd located the entry point, Fornell called Tony to tell him that the press conference location was ready and that if the guys looked out the front of the bank, they'd see a black SUV with tinted windows that would be used as the 'get-away car' once this was over. Cal assumed that the vehicle would have some sort of tracking system on it, but he didn't much care. Mick was a hot-shot mechanic and could disable any tracking device in less time than it took for the FBI to say "lo-jack."

The money, according to Fornell, would be there in fifteen minutes. "Fifteen minutes," Fornell said twice, just to be sure that Tony 'got it'. Tony rolled his eyes when Fornell said it the second time, and he repeated it back to him, as if he was talking to a third-grader.

"Was that 'fifteen minutes' Fornell?" Tony said with a smirk. Fornell hung up on him.

Cal, of course, wasn't that stupid, and so at the fifteen minute mark, he put a gun to Tony's head and stood him and a couple of other hostages in the front window of the bank in clear view of the FBI, the reporters, and everyone else who had gathered to watch the unfolding drama. The hostages were terrified, but Tony wasn't worried. He knew there was more to the plan than that.

At exactly fifteen minutes, an armored truck pulled up to the front of the bank next to the black SUV. As Cal concentrated on the armored truck, expecting a trap, Tony saw Gibbs' right hand, slowly doing a '5-4-3-2-1' countdown. At "1", Tony surprised Cal by grabbing his gun and forcing him to the ground at the exact moment that six FBI agents, Ziva, and McGee came storming in the back door, easily disarming a very surprised Mick. Tyler instantly dropped his gun and threw his hands up in the air, immensely relieved that it was all over.

The hostages froze in shock as the FBI agents cuffed the three men who had been holding them since early that morning. It had been such a surprise after such a quiet day that no one really knew how to react.

Tony grinned at Ziva and McGee as they gathered up the cell phones and other electronics to return to the hostages, all of whom were eager to make contact with their families. "Thanks guys," he said. McGee smiled back at him. Ziva tried to come up with a remark about how Tony could find trouble anywhere, but she failed miserably. In truth, she was glad that he was alright and that the day had led to a peaceful conclusion.

One of the FBI agents began to escort Cal outside when Tony stopped him. He looked at Cal with a mixture of relief and regret.

"Sorry you didn't get your message out," Tony said. He actually meant that. He really did, fundamentally, like the guy. As much as you can like someone who's been tacitly threatening to kill you since breakfast.

"No worries," Cal said, maintaining the calm demeanor he'd had most of the day. "I'll still be on the evening news, and there are a dozen people out there whose first question is going to be 'why'd you do it'. I'll get to say my piece."

Tony shook his head in disbelief as the FBI agent led Cal away to join his other two partners in crime outside.

And then, finally, the paramedics were sent in to bring out the injured parties. There were only two – Eric with his broken arm and a woman with a badly sprained ankle who had slipped and fallen when Tyler had told her to get out of his way when the take-over first happened. The woman's shoes were not exactly conducive to running and actually didn't even work with her body type or the outfit she had on. Tony, being a connoisseur of what really looked good on a woman, had thought about mentioning that to her earlier when they were all sitting around waiting for Fornell to do something, but he had visions of being hit in the head with a stiletto, and had opted against it. The older woman who Mick had yelled at so violently had calmed down considerably, and was even pluck enough to walk up to Mick and give him a stern "Shame on you!" once he'd been cuffed and put in the police car.

Tony was, to his own surprise, miraculously unscathed. In fact, he couldn't remember a case – ever – where he'd been on the receiving end of so many threats and so close to so many guys with guns only to have none of it materialize into physical confrontation or injury. It was disconcerting somehow.

Outside, Jess stood at the SWAT van – pacing, bouncing on the balls of her feet, hands going in and out of her pockets, trying to find some way to use up her nervous energy. Gibbs took her by the shoulders and looked into her eyes, commanding attention.

"He's fine, Jess," he said. "He's fine."

"Then where IS he?" she said, impatiently.

Inside the bank, Fornell walked into the room that had, until about 20 minutes ago, held 15 worried hostages and three anxious gunmen.

"Hey," Tony said, as he watched Fornell stop and look around the room.

"Nice work, DiNozzo," Fornell said. It was not lost on Tony that Fornell had actually pronounced his last name correctly.

"I didn't think I should leave the guns or the money unattended," Tony said, waving a hand to indicate the small pile of weapons and the banker's box of cash.

"Good call," Fornell said.

Tony took a deep breath and blew it out slowly.

"You did good work here, Tony," Fornell repeated. "You know, if you ever feel like switching agencies, there's a hostage negotiation program I know of that would be happy to have you."

"Thanks," Tony said with a half-smile, "but I think I'll stick to NCIS. I couldn't do this all the time."

Fornell nodded. "Well … if you ever change your mind."

Tony smiled and nodded. Then he looked to the front of the bank.

"SWAT, police, press, bystanders, tourists – we got everything, don't we?" he said, with fatigue evident in his voice.

"Yup," Fornell said. "But you need to get out there. Your team is worried, and your friend Jess is a little … anxious."

"I'll bet," Tony chuckled. "I half expected her to come in with the paramedics."

"She tried. Gibbs wouldn't let her."

Tony sighed, rubbing his eyes and running his hands through his hair. "God, I'm tired," he said, the adrenaline that had been pushing him all day finally gone.

"Then get out there, before you fall over and I have to carry you," Fornell said.

Tony turned to go, waving back at Fornell, who was starting an inventory of guns and cash with two other agents who had come in. "Fornell?" Tony said, as he walked through the lobby.

"Yeah?"

"Don't ever call me again."

Fornell chuckled and went back to work.

* * *

Tony walked out of the bank and stood at the top of the stairs, looking out into the night and feeling the cool breeze across his face. Then he looked down and saw Gibbs standing there, his hands on Jess' shoulders. She had her back to the bank and was obviously arguing with him. Gibbs looked up and saw Tony. He smiled, and then turned Jess around to face the bank. Jess looked back over her shoulder at Gibbs, who nodded. She crossed the police tape and walked straight to Tony. Her pace was relaxed, as if she were casually strolling through the park to meet a friend, but when she reached Tony at the base of the stairs, she hugged him so hard that he stumbled backwards a step.

"Hi," he said with a chuckle, as he returned the hug.

"Hi," she replied. "Are you okay?"

He released the hug, took a half-step back and took her hands in his. "We need to switch banks," he said, very seriously. Then he smiled. "And I could use a nap," he said.

She smiled and wrapped her arm around his waist as they turned and headed for the waiting collection of agents and reporters. They took a couple of steps in silence; then Tony looked at her. "You remembered 'letting the dog out'," he said, with a smile.

"Of course," she replied. "That was one of the ones we used the most."

"I was taking a chance with that," he said, shaking his head. "I wasn't sure that Gibbs would even let you in the door, much less think to ask you what the dog thing meant."

"He's smarter than he looks," Jess said with a grin.

"Speaking of that," Tony said, looking at her curiously. "How'd the date go?"

"I'll give you all the gory details later," she said with a mysterious smile. "Right now, let's find you a bed."

That was easier said than done. As soon as Tony got within shouting distance of the reporters, he was hit with a barrage of questions about the robbery, the stand-off, and how he'd managed to get everyone out without any guns being fired. Reporters asked him about his hostage negotiation experience, his police training, his time at NCIS, and one astute reporter even managed to work in a question about his father. A couple of reporters pounced on Jess, wondering how she fit into the equation, but she stayed quiet and retreated into the shadows. Ziva was actually impressed with Jess' restraint – how she'd handled herself earlier in the day, her refusal to talk to the press, and her patience as Tony answered questions and gave interviews for the evening news. At one point, Ziva found herself standing next to Jess, offering her a jacket and a cup of tea. Both of them were surprised.

Tony stood and answered questions for just over an hour before Gibbs finally told the reporters to "go file your stories and leave the man alone." After the press, Tony had to be debriefed by the FBI, a debriefing that Fornell kept mercifully short. At Gibbs' insistence, Tony would be allowed to complete his report after he'd had a good night's sleep and a day off.

It was after midnight when Jess and Tony finally got back to his place. Jess ordered pizza while Tony took a shower, and then he sunk into the couch with a sigh to watch himself on the news. He was asleep by the time the pizza arrived.

Jess put the pizza box in the fridge, turned off the TV and sat down on the couch next to her dozing friend. Tony immediately shifted, his legs stretching out to fill the couch, and his head dropping onto a pillow in Jess' lap. She fell asleep with her legs up on the coffee table and her hand on his chest, feeling his heart beat. They slept like that for about four hours. Just before sun-up, Tony woke up to go to the bathroom, after which he stumbled into his room and climbed into bed. Jess joined him a few minutes later, and they slept until almost noon.


	11. Chapter 10

**CHAPTER TEN**

Tony was the first one awake, and it took him a few minutes to figure out what had happened and where he was. It was after noon on a Tuesday, and no one had called to yell at him for not being at work. Then he remembered – the bank, the stand-off, the interviews. He looked at Jess, curled up next to him. He was just about to stretch and climb out of bed when his stomach rumbled. Loudly. So loudly in fact that it woke up Jess, whose head was resting fairly close to his ribcage.

"Hungry, much?" she laughed, as she wiped the sleep from her eyes and sat up.

"Yeah," he said with a smile. "Did we order pizza last night? I seem to remember ordering pizza."

"We did – but you were asleep before it got here. It's in the fridge."

"Then cold pizza for breakfast – lunch – it is," Tony said, as he hopped out of bed and threw on a t-shirt over his sweats. He looked back at Jess. "I have today off, right?" He had a slightly confused look on his face.

"You do," she assured him.

He reached out and pulled her out of bed, and she grabbed her jeans and slipped them on under the t-shirt she was wearing. They went out into the kitchen, pulled the pizza box out of the fridge and sat at the table to eat. It was silent for a few moments as they each devoured a slice. Then Jess got up to get them each something to drink.

"So," Tony said, as he took another slice of pizza. "You never told me how your date went with Gibbs. I got your e-mail the next morning, and he seemed like he was in a good mood, but I never got the play-by-play."

Jess looked at him in a way that was totally unreadable, something she hadn't been able to do with him for a long time.

"Not … good?" Tony asked. He wasn't sure if he'd wanted it to work out or not.

"Well," Jess began, as she brought the glasses to the table. "It wasn't bad, as dates go, but … well … the only thing we seemed to have in common was … you. You're the topic we'd always end up talking about."

"That explains the 'Dino' reference," Tony said with a raised eyebrow and an 'I can't believe you told him' expression.

"That was so not my fault!" Jess said. "It just slipped out while I was telling the story of Dino Kitty; he promised he wouldn't say anything."

Tony laughed and motioned for her to continue the story.

She sighed. "He can't stand opera; he doesn't like movies; he doesn't watch TV…" her voice trailed off. "And, well …" she added, "you know me and boats."

Tony nodded.

"I'd tell him some long involved story about something that happened when I was in Alaska or Berlin, and then he'd just ask me another question. I couldn't get a single story out of him about his childhood or school or even basic training." She sounded a little exasperated. "I mean, I know the guy keeps things a little close to the vest, but come on!" She looked up at Tony and sighed. "We ran out of conversation topics pretty quickly, and just ended up talking about you and work." She shrugged. "And, while I _adore_ talking about you …" (He stuck her tongue out at her; she retaliated by throwing pizza crust at him.) "… the last thing I need is someone else I can talk to about work."

Tony smiled sympathetically. "So," he said, "no chance that I'm going to get stuck between my boss and my best friend in a domestic dispute?"

"I don't think so," said Jess with a smile. "Although, he's a pretty good kisser," she said, her smile growing with the memory. "I'll give him that."

She laughed as Tony choked on his pizza and tried to regain his composure. "Too much information," Tony gasped, as he finished the iced tea in his glass and went to the sink for some water. "Way too much information."

He returned to the table. "What are you going to tell him?" Tony asked.

"Well," said Jess with a sigh, "we haven't really had time to deal with it. Things got a little hectic the next day …"

"Hey!" Tony said, with a mock-injured tone, "I was doing you a favor!"

Jess walked over and kissed him on the nose. "Yes, and I appreciate it," she said, placating him and drawing out a grin. She sat. "But now I'm stuck. You work with the guy. I can't just not say anything." She sighed. "If he calls, I have to say SOMETHING, and if he doesn't call…" her voice faded out. "I can't let it sit there."

"And this," Tony started to say, in a sing-songy teacher-like tone …

"Is why we don't date Tony's bosses," Jess and Tony finished the sentence in unison.

Jess shook her head and slumped in her chair. "You would think I'd have learned that by now," she said, allowing him the knowing grin he gave her.

"Yes," Tony said, returning to his lunch. "You would think."

* * *

Meanwhile, back at NCIS, Gibbs was having relatively the same discussion with Ducky.

"Well, Jethro," Ducky was saying. "I must admit to admiring the maturity you've exhibited in this circumstance. In the past, I daresay that you'd have continued the relationship regardless of the red flags you encountered and then simply added it to your list of unfortunate run-ins with the opposite sex after it was over."

Gibbs sighed, allowing Ducky his due. "Thank you Dr. Mallard," Gibbs said, with exaggerated reverence. "I'm so glad to know that I have finally exhibited enough maturity that you were compelled to notice and comment."

"Yes, well …" Ducky continued. "Perhaps you might want to make note of my methods when you next speak with Tony." He smiled.

Gibbs looked confused. "You saying I don't give DiNozzo enough credit for acting like … a grown-up?"

"Yes, well, that's another conversation altogether, isn't it, Jethro?" Ducky went back to the body on his table. "You were saying?"

Gibbs shook his head in frustration and took a deep, cleansing breath. He suddenly realized that he'd never made good on his promise to Jess to tell Tony that he was "a great agent."

Gibbs continued. "I was saying, _Doctor_, that I went out on a perfectly acceptable date with a perfectly acceptable woman, and I have absolutely no desire to go on another one. How do I tell her that?"

"Well," Ducky said, while plucking a bullet from the liver, "that would depend on why you have no desire to see her again."

"She's afraid of boats, Duck," Gibbs said, with exasperation, as if that explained everything. "And she tells these long involved stories that go on forever …" He stopped as Ducky looked up at him over the tops of his glasses. "Not that that in itself is a bad thing," Gibbs continued, pointedly, "but she expects the same thing out of me. Sometimes you just want to enjoy a meal without getting a show too." Again, a look from Ducky. Gibbs looked to the ceiling and sighed. "We ended up spending most of our time talking about work." Ducky looked up, curiously. Gibbs continued, "It was the only safe topic we seemed to have in common."

Ducky chuckled.

"She did make me laugh a few times," Gibbs said with a smile.

"A talent not to be taken lightly," Ducky offered.

Gibbs acknowledged the comment. "And she's an above-average kisser." Ducky's eyebrows went up and he looked down quickly to hide the smile that was forming. Gibbs sighed.

"But the bottom line," Gibbs said, "is that I need someone who doesn't have to talk all the time. Someone who would be just fine sitting in silence while we each do our own thing …"

"Until you decide that it's time to discuss some topic of your choice or take part in some extracurricular activity or another?" Ducky completed the thought. Gibbs rolled his eyes. "Yes," Ducky continued. "I don't see Miss Kennedy as being the type who would sit quietly by, watching you sand the ribs of your boat, and then jump to attention when you're ready for some … exercise."

"Yeah … so … what do I do?" Gibbs said, ignoring Ducky's teasing.

"What have you done in the past?" Ducky said.

"Not call."

"Ah … well …" Ducky dropped his medical instruments on the tray and began pulling off his gloves just as Jimmy walked in.

"Mister Palmer," Ducky said, "would you be so kind as to close our Petty Officer here, and then take the ballistics samples to Abby?"

"Of course, Doctor," Jimmy said with a smile. Ducky motioned to Gibbs to follow him. The two went into Ducky's office.

"Not calling is obviously not an option, Jethro," Ducky said, while pouring them each a finger of Scotch. "She's Tony's best friend, and he's bound to be curious." Gibbs nodded solemnly.

Ducky laughed. "For goodness sake, Jethro," Ducky said, "just tell her that it's not going to work out. The woman isn't going to throw herself off a building because Leroy Jethro Gibbs doesn't want a second date."

"I'm not afraid of her getting suicidal, Ducky," Gibbs said as he drained his glass. "I'm more worried about …"

"Homicidal?" Ducky said with a barely concealed grin. "She's not your second wife, Gibbs. And I doubt that she'd do anything to jeopardize Tony's place on the team. She might be …" He was obviously searching for the right word. "She might be … disappointed," Ducky continued with a light chuckle, "but I think it might be a bit too much self-flattery to think that she'd resort to murder."

Gibbs shot him a dirty look.

"But you could always put yourself in protective custody," Ducky said. "If you're worried." The coroner finished his drink and began to put on his coat to leave. Gibbs followed him out and into the elevator.

"Besides," Ducky said. "It's entirely possible that she feels exactly the same way." Gibbs turned to look at him, incredulously, as the elevator doors closed.


	12. Chapter 11

**CHAPTER ELEVEN**

When Tony and Jess left the bank scene on Monday night, they had left Tony's car in the NCIS lot and taken Jess' car back to Tony's place. Which explained why it was Jess' car, and not Tony's, that was side-swiped by a maniac in a mud-spattered SUV as she'd pulled into the NCIS garage to drop Tony at work Wednesday morning.

As luck would have it, the maniac behind the wheel of the SUV was Leroy Jethro Gibbs, who had taken the turn just a little too wide. Tony was both amused and alarmed to realize that Gibbs drove his own car the exact same way that he drove the government-issue cars. ('Note to self: Do not ride with Gibbs – ever'.) The second the SUV made impact with Jess' Saturn, she'd sworn and swerved, Tony had slammed against the window, and they'd looked at each other in disbelief when they saw who the other driver was.

"This is not going to be pretty," Jess and Tony said, in nearly perfect unison.

Gibbs stormed over to Jess' car and was about to let go with a tirade regarding learning how to drive and what it meant to hit the car of a government employee when he saw the passenger side door open to reveal his senior field agent.

"What the …?" Gibbs said, clearly surprised.

"'Morning Boss," Tony said, as non-confrontationally as possible. He had kind of a 'sorry, dude' look on his face as he pointed to the parking lot, where his car still sat from the night before. "Left my car here Monday night … after the, um, bank thing … Jess … drove me in …" His voice faded out as Jess slowly opened the driver's side door, which was badly scratched and dented but not structurally damaged. She looked at Gibbs somewhat awkwardly, not entirely sure how to approach the situation. Not only was there the "second date" scenario hanging over them, there was now also the "you just hit my car" thing. She willed the ground to open up and transport her to the safety of her office at the Pentagon. But then again, she had to admit that this would make a very funny story to tell one day when she was having beers with her friends and they were asking her how her love life was going.

Tony cleared his throat and walked over to Jess. "You okay?" he asked, as he tried to read the expression on her face.

"Yeah," she said, with a defeated sigh, looking down at her car door. "I'll talk to you later."

"Okay," Tony said quickly, as he grabbed his bag from her car and shut the door. "Thanks for the ride," he said as he nearly sprinted to the elevator. He'd never been happier to get out of a situation in his life, and that included the day before yesterday when he had three guns pointed at him.

Gibbs, meanwhile, was cursing his luck. He had been preoccupied all the way to work, trying to figure out how best to avoid dealing with Jess, and here he was, standing in the parking lot with the very person he'd been trying to steer clear of.

"Karma, my dear Jethro," he could hear Ducky saying. "Never try to avoid someone to whom you owe an explanation."

Gibbs looked up as Tony sprinted away. Jess was watching him.

"You hit my car," she said, with a kind of subdued disbelief.

"Well, I didn't do it on purpose," he said, probably more defensively than he needed to.

Her eyebrows went up in surprise. "I didn't say you did," she said, defending herself. There was a beat of silence. "But you hit my car," she repeated, looking back down at the damage. "No one has ever hit my car."

"Look," he said, finding himself annoyed at her apparent lack of ability to just deal with this. "I'll file the paperwork and you can call your insurance company and just … do whatever you have to do. It's my fault, I'll pay for it. It's only a car." He turned back to his SUV and started to get back in.

"That's it?" Jess said, as he turned to go. "No, 'I'm sorry I hit your car Jess'? No, 'are you okay'? Maybe even a, 'do you need a ride to work'?"

"It's drivable," Gibbs said crossly, pointing to the damage. "You don't need a ride to work." He knew he was being more bad-tempered than he needed to be, but he didn't want to do this here, now. He wanted to e-mail her or leave her a message or maybe tell Tony to tell her that he didn't want to go out with her again, and now there was this stupid car thing that had to be dealt with and he didn't want to deal with that either.

She laughed. "I know it's drivable, Jethro," she said. "But that was a little on the brusque side, even for you."

Gibbs looked at her and sighed. She was right. She didn't deserve that. "Look," he said, his voice calmer and friendlier. "Can we just agree that this is an incredibly uncomfortable moment and both walk away?" he said, with a desperation in his voice that kind of amused her.

"Of course," she said with a reserved smile, getting back into her car. "You know how to reach me with … insurance information … or … whatever."

He, once again, started to get into his car. But Jess got back out of hers and called after him. "Jethro," she called.

"I was so close," he whispered to himself. He got back out of his car and looked at her.

"I had a nice time the other night," Jess said. He opened his mouth to answer, but she cut him off. "It was fun," she said, "and I hope you enjoyed it too, but I don't really think there's a future there, do you? I mean, with us. The whole dating thing." She could feel herself rambling but she kept going anyway. "It's just that you're Tony's boss, and it's not like I didn't know that when you asked me out in the first place and you're certainly not the first one of Tony's bosses that I've dated …" His eyebrows went up and his mouth turned into a small smile. "… and that's probably way too much information," she continued, shaking her head, "but seriously, you're a wonderful man, I just don't think that …"

"Jess!" Gibbs said, stopping the stream of words falling out her mouth. "It's okay. I feel the same way."

She looked at him with a relieved smile. "Good," she said, relaxing for the first time since she'd seen him today. "Good." She smiled at him, turned and got into her car.

He walked over to the damaged door and looked at it more closely. He'd really scraped the side up badly. "I am sorry about your car," he said, sincerely. "I'll take of it," he reassured her.

"Damn right you will," she said with a grin. "I've got a witness."

"Yeah?" Gibbs said, grinning back at her. "I'd almost go to court, just to see whose side he'd take."

"That, Special Agent Gibbs, would be evil."

They both laughed at the thought, and Gibbs closed the door for her as she settled in her car. He waved goodbye as Jess turned and drove back out the driveway, honking the horn once in response. That had been much easier than he'd expected. He couldn't recall any other woman he'd ever gone out with who didn't want to physically harm him after he'd broken it off. Maybe there was something to this whole 'being an adult' thing after all. Go figure.

* * *

Upstairs in the bullpen, Tony was a ball of nervous energy, waiting for Gibbs to come back upstairs.

"Oh for heaven's sake, Tony, just sit down!" Ziva exclaimed. His nervousness was making HER nervous.

"I can't, Ziva," Tony said, anxiously eyeing the elevator. "I have no idea what's happening down there."

"Well I haven't heard sirens yet," she said, turning back to her computer.

"Tony!" McGee said, as he came around the corner. "You looked good on the news last night."

Tony stopped pacing and grinned at McGee. "Really?" he said. "How good?"

Ziva snorted a laugh. McGee opened his mouth to speak, but was cut off as Gibbs came off the elevator.

"I'm sure we can have some tapes delivered if you'd like to add it to your personal collection, DiNozzo," Gibbs said.

Tony looked quickly back-and-forth from Gibbs to the elevator to the window (to see if, maybe, Jess' car was on fire or something) and then to McGee and Ziva. "Everything okay, Boss?" he asked, confused and relieved and, above all, curious.

Gibbs looked up with a straight face. "Fine, DiNozzo," he said. "Why wouldn't it be?" Tony opened his mouth to ask another question, but Gibbs beat him to it. "Don't you have a report to write for the FBI?" he said.

"On it, Boss," Tony said, with a little less enthusiasm than usual. He would just have to wait until he got the e-mail from Jess.


	13. Chapter 12

**CHAPTER TWELVE**

All morning long secretaries, evidence personnel, IT technicians, communications specialists, and a bevy of other female government employees stopped by Tony's desk to tell him how good he looked on the news and to be regaled with the details of the hostage situation earlier that week. They all stood by his desk, attentive and awestruck, as he told the tale of Cal, Tyler and Mick over and over again. To the surprise of both Ziva and McGee, Tony did not embellish the story the more he told it. He simply told his eager listeners what happened and that everyone had been lucky that Calvin Davidson hadn't been a "body count" type of guy.

"But … weren't you scared?" said Bobbi from Personnel, her eyes wide and her cheeks slightly flushed.

"Well … sure," Tony said, "but you've got a job to do and you just, you know, do it."

She perched on the side of his desk, her face turning as thoughtful as the face of a 22-year-old receptionist who went to an all-girls college and still lived with her parents and three cats named Fluffy, Muffy and Scruffy can.

"I would have been _terrified_," she said, placing her hand on his and looking straight into his eyes.

"I think you'd have been just fine," he said with a smile, patting her hand with his other hand. They looked at each other for a few seconds and then Bobbi blushed bright pink and quickly stood up and composed herself.

"I'm just glad, um, that you're … you know …back safe," she said. She frowned. "Safe_ly_," she amended. "I'm always forgetting the 'ly' at the end of things … words … I really wish they had a grammar-check for brains, don't you?"

Tony smiled sweetly and said, "I do."

Bobbi turned a brighter red and hurried to the elevator to get back to her desk. She now had a picture in her mind of Tony looking at her and saying 'I do'. This would make all those fantasies about her becoming 'Mrs. Anthony DiNozzo' so much better. She couldn't wait to call the girls in the evidence garage!

"Nice," McGee said with a half-grin as Bobbi ran off.

"What?" Tony said with an innocent smile. "I didn't do anything."

Ziva looked up from her computer. "Did you just spill your soda, or is that charm oozing out from under your desk?" she said with a shake of the head.

Tony quickly looked at his soft drink cup, which was fine, and under his desk, which was ooze-free.

"Made ya look," she said, with a smug grin. McGee laughed, and Tony turned back to his work.

At noon, Abby insisted on taking Tony to lunch to celebrate his "not being dead." They went to Tony's favorite deli, where most of the patrons there made a fuss over him and his heroics, and where the deli owner – who had never before been known to give _anything_ away – not only paid for Tony's meal but promised to name a sandwich after him.

"Make it prosciutto and provolone, toasted, with banana peppers and oil & vinegar," Tony requested. And that's how a sandwich named "The DiNozzo" became part of the menu at Arturo's Deli.

As Abby and Tony were returning from lunch, one of the IT guys caught up with them in the elevator. He had seen Tony on the news too but was really much more interested in Jess – who she was, what she meant to Tony, what their relationship was, and was she available. Tony took the guy's name and number and said he'd pass it along, but he made no promises. After the whole thing with Gibbs, Tony figured that the last thing Jess needed was an IT geek trying to get a date.

Tony and Abby were also intercepted in the elevator by Ducky, who pulled Tony down to Autopsy, made two cups of tea, and sat down to hear the whole story.

"I know that you've likely told the tale dozens of times today, my boy," Ducky apologized, "but I do so want to hear what happened. Do you mind?"

Tony didn't, of course, and he spent the next hour or so telling the kind of 'all details included' story that only someone like Ducky could fully appreciate. Ducky, for his part, filled in the narrative with "Oh my" and "Good lord" at all the appropriate places, asking questions about the various personalities Tony had met and wondering if perhaps young Harry, the applied nursing student, was a contemporary of Mr. Palmer's at medical school.

Tony actually enjoyed being able to relate the entire saga from the bank, including all of his thoughts and fears and insecurities about whether or not he was doing the right thing through it all.

"I think the worst moment was when Mick started yelling about the FBI not doing anything right," Tony said. He blew out a breath and shook his head. "I thought he was going to snap right there." He looked at Ducky with a kind of wonder in his expression. "But Cal had it handled. It was pretty strange, really," Tony said. "It was like he was channeling Gibbs."

Ducky chuckled. "Well," he said, standing up and taking the teacups and other dishes to the sink, "there are bound to be more of them out there."

Tony chuckled and nodded. "The tricky part is keeping track of which ones use their powers for good versus those who use their powers for evil."

"Indeed," Ducky said with a sage nod. "Indeed."

By about four o'clock, the novelty of Tony-the-Hero had worn off and it was work as usual. Jess had finally e-mailed him to give him the scoop on her talk with Gibbs. After calling Tony a chicken for sprinting off so quickly, she wrote: "It really wasn't all that bad. I told him that I thought he was a great guy, but that there was really nothing there, and he agreed with me. I think we parted as friends, which I realize is not the way any of us expected it to go. It was very grown-up, really. Of course, now I'll be stuck with nothing to do on Saturday nights, but such is life."

"Poor, poor, pitiful Jess," Tony teased in his return e-mail. And then he passed along the IT guy's number, writing that "this computer guy – who is NOT my boss, please make note – cornered me in the elevator to tell me how hot you were … you should call him." He smiled as he hit the 'send' button. What were friends for, anyway?

They were all just about to call it a day when a late call came in that pulled the entire team up to MTAC.

"We have reports of an Abu Sayyaf terrorist trying to assimilate onto the crew of a Navy cargo ship," Director Shepard began as soon as the team was seated. "However, we also have an NCIS operative – Abog Galib" – on board who we believe has identified the terrorist among the crew. We need to send someone onto the ship to make contact with Galib and collect any information he has. That someone, Jethro, will be you."

"Okay," Gibbs said, taking a sip of his coffee. "How?"

"You'll be boarding the ship tonight for a routine credentials check – passports and shipping orders – just prior to them sailing. Galib's passport will be in question. You'll pull him aside, get his intel, and then clear him to sail. He'll monitor the situation on ship; we'll pass along the information you receive to Navy Intel, who will intercept the ship en route and capture the Abu Sayyaf radical."

"Sounds pretty simple," Gibbs said, nodding.

"It should be," Director Shepard acknowledged. Then she looked at Tony. "I'm sorry we can't give you a more exciting first day back, but it can't all be bank robberies and interviews on the evening news." She smiled. "Congratulations, by the way," the Director said with obvious pride. "You made us look good on Monday. I've had a dozen phone calls from all levels to congratulate the agency. There's talk of an Award of Merit being presented. And the FBI wants to borrow you for their Hostage Negotiation unit."

To everyone's surprise, Tony did not puff up at the praise. In fact, he seemed somewhat embarrassed by the attention. He blushed slightly and looked at his feet, a sheepish smile on his face. "Yeah," he said. "Fornell mentioned that."

The Director continued. "I told them that I'd pass along the offer and leave it up to you." Then she changed back to a more serious tone and indicated, again, the pictures of the ship and past Abu Sayyaf operations behind her. "For the time being, though, you're needed here. You'll be running the operation from the docks."

Tony looked up, any hint of embarrassment gone. "Yes Ma'am," he said.

"That's all," said Director Shepard, as she turned and left MTAC to return to her office.

"The Hostage Negotiation unit, Tony?" McGee said, obviously impressed. "That's pretty cool. You didn't tell us that."

"No need to, Probie," Tony said casually. "I wasn't really considering it at all."

"Too much work, Tony?" Ziva teased.

"No, Zee-vah," Tony teased back. "I just couldn't bear the time away from you." He cocked his head to the side and smiled sweetly. Ziva made a face and was about to answer when Gibbs cut her off.

"We have a mission that goes down in less than four hours," he said as he led the team out of MTAC and back down to the bullpen. "Maybe you can all wait until later to decide what DiNozzo wants to be when he grows up." As soon as he said the words, Gibbs again remembered what Ducky had said about him not giving Tony enough credit, and he again reminded himself to make good on his promise to Jess.

"On it, Boss," Tony and McGee said, in unison, as the three agents went to their desks.

By 9 p.m., the team was dockside at the Norfolk Naval Yard. They were waiting for the final go-ahead from the Director. Ziva and McGee were doing a final sweep of the area for anything suspicious while Tony and Gibbs set up the surveillance equipment and double-checked the timeline. At 9:15 they got the signal, and Gibbs glanced towards the car that held Ziva and McGee, making a "we're rolling" signal. He looked at Tony, who gave him a thumbs-up, and then Gibbs headed to the ship. Tony was just about to join the others in the car when his movements were interrupted by Gibbs.

"Tony," Gibbs said, turning back as he approached the gangplank. "Monday night, after the bank thing. I never got a chance to tell you."

"Tell me what, Boss?" Tony said, a bit distracted as he ran the op scenario through in his mind one more time.

"You did good work in there," Gibbs said, walking back and putting a hand on Tony's shoulder. Tony was startled, and looked straight at his boss.

"What?" Tony said, in surprise.

"You did good work in the bank. You're shaping up to be a great agent," Gibbs continued.

"Boss?" Tony said, confused now.

"Don't make me say it again, DiNozzo," Gibbs said with a slight smile and a look designed to force the point home.

Tony smiled. "Thanks Boss."

Gibbs smiled and nodded, and then he turned and headed up the gangplank to board the ship.


	14. Epilogue

**EPILOGUE**

The Abu Sayyaf operation ended up not being as quick and easy as everyone had thought it would be. Although no one knew it, NCIS operative Galib was already dead when Gibbs came aboard, and Gibbs was led straight into a trap by Pin Pin Pula, the terrorist who had assumed Galib's identity. An explosion designed to take Gibbs' life took his memory instead, and a series of unbelievable decisions by the higher-ups a few days later took his spirit. By the time it was all over, an angry and defeated Gibbs had 'retired' from NCIS, left Tony in charge, and headed off to Mexico to join another bitter ex-NCIS agent, his old boss, Mike Franks.

For his part, Tony took over the leadership of the team, almost against his will. Any praise or accolades he'd received after the bank situation faded quickly as people closely watched his every move, wondering if he was truly going to be able to "be Gibbs."

A few weeks after Gibbs left – and then came back again to help Ziva out of a situation of her own and then left _again_ – there came a report of a possible connection between the son of a high-ranking officer and a suspected meth lab being run by both Marines and Naval personnel. A task force was put together to find the lab and clear the son's name. Tony was offered the NCIS slot on what was to be a short, but potentially dangerous, undercover mission. He jumped at the chance to get out of the office and away from the unsure looks and doubting comments of his new team.

The mission didn't go quite the way it should have, however, and about two weeks in, Tony found himself black-and-blue and tied to a chair in a warehouse in upstate New York, hoping that someone would think to come looking for him.

But …that's another story …


End file.
